Y1n-Y9ng SL Star Battle
(Published on 24. March 2023, 16:00 by Blobz)
Normal sudoku rules apply.
Yin-Yang: Shade some cells such that all shaded cells are orthogonally connected, all unshaded cells are orthogonally connected, and no 2x2 area is either fully shaded or unshaded.
White dots lie on the border between the shaded and unshaded regions. Additionally, white dots separate consecutive digits. Not all possible dots are shown.
Sight Lines: Digits in caged cells show the number of cells of the same color (shaded or unshaded) seen orthogonally from that position, including itself. The "other" color blocks vision.
Star Battle: Put exactly two stars in every row, column and box such that no stars touch each other, not even diagonally. You can put stars on 1's and 9's only.
All 1's are in the shaded region. The two given 9's are in the shaded region; the other seven 9's are in the unshaded region.
Have fun, leave a comment if you enjoy the puzzle!
Solution code: Row 4 followed by Row 6
Comments
on 28. July 2024, 23:05 by wuc
Done the first three of the series. Awesome setting. Very homogenous difficulty and many clever deductions required. Great fun to solve thx
on 23. June 2024, 04:54 by virus_dave
Oh wow, this one was fun! I've never had to do both star battle AND yin yang before; that made my normal method of coloring for each unavailable. Nonetheless, i made it work! What a clever puzzle!
on 18. May 2024, 21:27 by Abbott Abbott
I've always adored star battle puzzles but I had never seen it incorporated into a sudoku before this, so thank you for that :)
on 2. October 2023, 06:03 by Blobz
Updated ruleset, based on feedback.
on 22. August 2023, 00:11 by szabog
Again, a joy to solve, thank you :)
A suggestion to avoid the confusion. Just copy the usual star battle rules: Put exactly two stars in every row, column and area such that no stars touch each other, not even diagonally.
Then add: You can put stars on 1s and 9s only.
---
Thanks for the feedback. I've updated the puzzle to make the Star Battle portion clearer; thanks for the suggested wording.
~Blobz
on 27. July 2023, 09:50 by Snookerfan
Very nice! The last line in the ruleset confused me, so in the end when I could not get started I made an assumption about the meaning of that line, which lead to the solution. Thank you.
on 18. April 2023, 16:11 by Blobz
Clarified Star Battle rules.
on 18. April 2023, 03:14 by Vorox3
I am slightly confused on the Star Battle constraint. Is it saying that 1 being diagonally to a 9 is disallowed? Or is it just "1-to-1" and "9-to-9," so to speak?
—-
No 1 or 9 can be a (chess) king’s move away from any other 1 or 9.
on 25. March 2023, 22:40 by Kavman15
Lovely puzzle! I was also a bit confused with the rule set at first.
on 24. March 2023, 23:42 by Calvinball
Thanks for the puzzle Blobz!
And thanks for the heads up that it was getting published today. :P -Michael
